San Francisco wins bid for Super Bowl L

BOSTON – The San Francisco Bay Area has been awarded Super Bowl L, the NFL announced during league meetings Tuesday. It will be the second time the area has hosted a Super Bowl.

The game is scheduled for February 2016 at the San Francisco 49ers' new stadium in Santa Clara. Levi's Stadium will officially open in 2014 and reportedly is nearing the halfway point in its construction. The stadium is adjacent to the team's training complex. It is also next to Great America amusement park and across from the Santa Clara Convention Center.

"It's an awesome, awesome thing that they've allowed us to host one of the biggest games; the golden anniversary in the Golden State," 49ers CEO Jed York said. "We're just really, really excited."

The last time San Francisco hosted the Super Bowl was January 1985, when the game was played at Stanford Stadium between the 49ers and Miami Dolphins. The 49ers won that game, the second of the team's five Super Bowl titles.

"The vote didn't really surprise me," Dolphins owner Stephen Ross said. "I had hope because it was really a great bid put together and Miami is really a great place. Like I said to the owners, 'Where would you rather be this time of year but Miami?' I think most people probably feel that way. But that stadium is definitely the issue."

Ironically, San Francisco's bid for Super Bowl L beat South Florida's hopes for an 11th Super Bowl game. Miami's bid was hit hard when the Florida legislature refused to move on a possible referendum that would have provided $200 million in public funding as part of roughly $400 million improvements to Sun Life Stadium. The NFL has been pushing the city and team owner Stephen Ross for upgrades since the February 2010 championship in Miami, three years after the Indianapolis Colts' Super Bowl victory over the Chicago Bears in the same stadium was hit by rain.

"I really believe the NFL wants to be in Miami, there is no question," Ross said. "We have had 10 Super Bowls, the 11th would have been a record. Where would you rather be? I definitely think we can get there, but I think it is going to take a real public-private partnership to get there."

The next two Super Bowls are scheduled to be played in New Jersey next February and in Glendale, Ariz., in 2015.